Reading Challenges

I have been very fortunate with my older 2 daughters. They are both avid readers. My 8yr old gave me a run for my money when we introduced phonics & beginning reading skills. She would look at me as if I were an alien, it seemed as if she could not comprehend anything I was saying/teaching her. It was a very frustrating time for me. My oldest learned to read so easily, I thought I was just such a great teacher, LOL!!! With daughter #2 I quickly learned that I had lucked out with my oldest and that each child approaches learning with different abilities, interests, and learning styles. But once she finally grasped that these symbols represented specific sounds and when put together unlocked the words in her favorite books, she was hooked. She is now 8yr old and is currently reading Caddie Woodlawn and Heidi (unabridged) on her own. Above grade level is my point. From there I am at a loss. I am currently trying to teach my 5 (almost 6) yr old BOY to read. This is proving itself to be a bigger challenge than daughter #2. Some days we will start the lessons & he will have no clue that we have ever discussed the sounds before. This would be an indication that he is not ready for this yet, I should wait a few more months & try again, Better Late Than Early and all that jazz. But the very next day he will rattle of the sounds perfectly, as if he has known them his whole life, HUH?! Now I am really confused, what do I do?! Of course, when he is cooperative we plow full steam ahead but when he starts looking at me cross-eyed we put it away for the day and move on to something else before Mommy gets too frustrated. So I can see that this is going to be a challenge especially when he announced today that he doesn't want to learn to read, he likes it when we read to him. For the first time I have mulled over bribery. I do NOT like giving rewards for reading. The reward in reading is the knowledge gained and the story enjoyed but he is tempting me. I have never allowed my kids to join in summer reading programs or anything that gives them toys or food for reading so many books. Though I did consider trying the one from Barnes and Noble this summer. They were offering a free book for every 8 books read. This sounded like a good deal until I found out the books the kids would get for free, it is of less value than a candy bar. Actually, my 8 yr old might have enjoyed them, Magic Tree House books but they were way below the books my 10 yr old is reading, this would not have been a worthwhile prize for her. So, in lieu of the junky books, we opted to start our own summer reading program. She is allowed to read any 8 books off of her free reading list for school & she can pick out a book that I will buy for her. This goes for both girls. So far Abby has read 4 books (we started this 2 weeks ago) and she is in process with 4 more. She has finished the Chronicles of Narnia Series and The Lord of the Rings series, she loves these types of books. Not my thing at all but this will be the type of thing she will choose. Now I'm trying to figure out how to tweak this incentive for Jack to encourage him to try harder to learn to read, maybe when he can read the first series of BOB books he can pick out a free book, I'm just afraid he will choose a picture & sound book from Pirates of the Caribbean or something absurd like that. To his credit though, he is really enjoying Charlotte's Web (which I am reading to him), Peter Pan (Abby is reading to him), and Pinocchio (Erin is reading to him) all unabridged so I know he is capable of grasping the good stuff, it's just not his first choice. The challenge of boys and I've got one more (at least) coming up after him....